


Blue or Red?

by ThinlyVeiledSarcasim



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Dubious Consent, Implied/Referenced Torture, Stockholm if you squint, Temporary Amnesia, Trapped, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-31
Updated: 2016-01-05
Packaged: 2018-05-10 13:54:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5588485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThinlyVeiledSarcasim/pseuds/ThinlyVeiledSarcasim
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fear gripped you tightly that night. You sank into the corner and cried yourself to sleep. You prayed that Frisk and Flowey could avoid the same fate as you. A scared, cowardly part of you hoped that they would come back to save you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I'm Okay

**Author's Note:**

> In which the author is ashamed and you are not entirely sure you know what's going on.

The wind howls angrily outside. The poorly made walls shake and shudder as the wind slips between the panels and whistles. You’re cold. But that’s not new and you are okay. It’s not a deep cold, only a slight chill that numbs your fingers and makes your breath visible. You’re okay, though, this is okay. It’s an even night, tonight, and it’s quiet in a general sense. Your room (but _prison_ is the correct term) is small but sheltered from the snow. It’s drafty, but you’re not knee deep in snow. You’re lying on your side, nestled in blankets that you’ve drawn together in a mess that saves you from the concrete floor and offers a lumpy pillow. You are left waking up with a sore back and a kink in your neck, but it’s what you had and you made due. You were nothing if not inventive. You tear your eyes away from the snow painted window to the wooden bars that kept you secluded to the back half of the already small shack. They were uniformly placed and far too close together for you to slip through. You had tried, the first night. No matter if you starved yourself, willingly or not, you’d never get yourself through them unless your bones suddenly became malleable. Funny, you never thought you’d envy pet cat for the fluidity of its skeleton.

You had been here… for a while? You’re not exactly sure. You only have one person to talk to and you doubted that he’d answer if you were brave enough to ask. Time was a rather daunting when you had nothing to do. You knew he came around once a day, maybe, and he’d ask the same question. You would refuse to answer, he’d threaten you, you’d cower in the corner praying he wouldn’t make good on them. Sometimes he did, sometimes he just walked away muttering under his breath. He’d never crossed into your cage, he’d never been within arm’s reach of you – but that meant shit when it came to what he could do.

Your wrist itch, the skin stings and reminds you cruelly that you can’t do anything about it. Your hands are bound together by rough twine that may or may not have been a dogs leash at some point. They’ve been like this since you were thrown in here. The skin growing darker and rawer as the days stretched on. It made things difficult, but you learned to manage after the first couple of days. It looks bad, but it doesn’t smell yet and there is only a little bit of puss. It’s clear, though, so you know that you are okay for now; even if blisters are starting to form…

As the door rattles loudly on its hinges, your heart races for a second. You know he’s due to show up at some point, but hope that it’s the wind. It is and you are glad. When you calm yourself, counting to ten slowly, you let your mind wander. It walks back over the events that lead you here. You were missing key parts, like how you had gotten here, but you knew that you had fallen.

A child had woken you in a panic, a flower with a face potted in their boot. The flower, Flowey it had said its name was, told you that both of you needed to get out of the ruins before the caretaker found you. Toriel, he had warned, you needed to avoid her. It guided you through the ruins, the child taking the traps with a bravery that you couldn’t conjure up in your shaken state.

How did you get here? Where were you? Why was the talking flower warning you that everything down here was going to try and kill you? Who was the child? You knew them, but you didn’t.

‘It’s kill or be killed, please – we need to get out of here.’

You shiver involuntarily, rubbing your face into the crook of your arm.

The monster named Toriel was terrifying, but the child – Frisk they had told you – stepped bravely between you and the fire. They didn’t fight back, but dodged the flames expertly and had worn down the monster to the point Flowey had been able to tangle the goat-like creature in a mess of vines before you both bolted towards the rusted doors. You think on the first breath of winter air that washed over you from the forest beyond and tried to remember if you could ever recall being warm. The anguish on Frisk’s face confused you. There was no fear, only a loss tinged with inexplicable hurt. You asked them what was wrong, they had answered tentatively that the monster was so sad. That they wished they could have helped her more.

They had asked, then, if you remembered.

You asked what you were supposed to remember and Frisk held Flowey tightly to their chest. They looked scared, then, and on the verge of tears. They held them back as they turned down the path saying that it was fine. They’d fix this. They were determined.

Fix what? You asked.

They didn’t answer.

The forest would have been beautiful if you were not so afraid of the dangers that might lurk past the pines. You walked for what felt like hours after a child who seemed to know exactly where they were going. Flowey didn’t speak beyond a soft, muttered question about your name and who you were. He had never seen an adult human before, he began, and then clarified that you an adult, right? You laughed weakly, more manically than appropriate, and told him that yes. You were. He had asked how you both had ended up falling, but you couldn’t remember. Frisk had started to reply when you were reminded that this was a world of monsters. While Frisk seemed to expect everything, they hadn’t expected the two monsters you stumbled on.

They spotted you first and you told Frisk to run. The words had barely left your mouth before your face was buried in the snow. The weight of what felt like a house bowing your back. One of the monsters was shouting, but when you looked up Frisk and Flowey were gone. You were relieved. The monsters then had dragged you kicking and screaming through the forest into a town.

You were a mass of flailing limbs in skeletal arms trying to keep you from bolting. You’d gotten in a solid kick to the smaller one who flinched away clutching at his face where your heel had dug in and caught on an empty socket. You hoped it hurt, you hoped it was fucking painful. The taller one, dressed in black armor, had back handed you when you were screaming bloody murder and he’d lost his patience. Your breath left you when you hit the ground, the force of the blow knocking you from your feet. Your head swam and you tasted blood. His gloved hands dug into your skin as he picked you up, throwing you over his shoulder like you weighed nothing. He barked at the other for being sloppy, voice deceptively intimidating for such a high tenor.

Dreading the consequences, you didn’t dare struggle against his second hold. You yelped when he wrenched open the shed door and threw you into your cage. You landed hard, white-hot pain sparking up your spine as you curled inward clutching at your back. You stared at them through wet eyes, teeth ground together as you begged them not to hurt you.

It fell on deaf ears as the taller skeleton (Oh dear sweet Lord) whirled on the other. He was a stouter monster, considerably shorter with a round skull stuck in what looked like a permanent smile. He was dressed plainly in comparison, only one of his sockets ignited with a hovering red iris. He looked nonplussed as the armored monster read him the riot-act. He wasn’t without colorful names for the smaller monster for allowing the other human to escape. That while he fixed his mistakes – again – that the shorter was to remain and get any useful information out of you. The skeleton didn’t argue, nodding vaguely, and trailed after the taller one when he stomped out with a dramatic, albeit dangerous, flare.

Fear gripped you tightly that night. You sank into the corner and cried yourself to sleep. You prayed that Frisk and Flowey could avoid the same fate as you. A scared, cowardly part of you hoped that they would come back to save you.

The sound of the door opening pulls your attention and you flinch at the sight of the grinning monster.

“Sup,” He says in a jovial tone, walking up to the bars with a grin that is so contradicting it’s painful to look at.

 


	2. The Trouble with Names are...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where the authors tears their hair out trying to write this garbage and you learn that you're not the right colour and that your interrogator has a short fuse.

You curl your knees to your chest attempting to make yourself smaller as you tug one of the ragged blankets over your legs. The action is awkward, with bound hands, but you’ve long since accepted that everything you attempt will be. It doesn’t offer any spare warmth; you only do it to feel less exposed. You made a show of rubbing your thigh with fisted hands. Look, you weren’t afraid of him. You were just cold, you see? You aren’t shaking and he isn’t the one inspiring your staggering anxiety. For good measure, you pull another over your shoulder. You wrap yourself in an open cocoon of rags – but it doesn’t stop the tremor in your swollen hands.

But that is okay.

You are okay.

You’re a good liar, you think, you almost believe yourself.

The wavering red iris (because you cannot call what he has an eye) watches you with lazy contemplation. His coat, black leather, is dusted with snowfall that’s trapped in the faux-fur. You wonder, vaguely, how the snow hadn’t collected in the empty sockets of his skull as he takes his skeletal hands to shake it free. He does so with harsh, quick tugs – but he’s careful when he swipes his hand across the top of his skull. The sound of grating bone is grainy and makes your teeth ache – it’s akin to nails on a chalkboard.

You watch apprehensively as he moves to retrieve the chair forgotten in the corner. His steps are hard against the wood flooring; hard and heavy, with forced weight behind them. He’s all hard edges. It’s evident in everything about the monster. From his style of clothing to the way he carries himself. You had thought, at first, it was a show. Something done to intimidate you – but you are not so sure anymore. It’s too natural, too automatic, to be forced. He doesn’t need to work at being terrifying, you frown, he’s a monster. He’s a skeleton that looks to have walked off the anatomy rack with a factious grin. While he isn’t the exact replica of a human skeleton, you are reminding yourself that he is a monster. He’s not a human skeleton. His skull is too rounded; his smile is too… comical? The other one, he had been closer –but neither were _exactly_ what you knew lay under your skin.

 You are thankful, to a vague degree. To you, nothing is more terrifying than skinless bone. A phobia deep rooted from a trauma suffered _years_ ago. But you refuse to dwell on the thought longer than it merits. You jolt when he slumps into the chair like he’s been on his feet far too long. He pulls out a bag from his inside his jacket. It’s brown and made of paper – dotted with grease spots. It fills the room with the smell of fast food and burnt cheese. He leans forward, grins with half lidded sockets, and shakes it as if he is beckoning you with it. Your eyes fall from the bag to the dog dish he’s mocked you with repeatedly, but you turn your nose away as he barks a laugh. He could have his laugh; you weren’t going to eat from it. You still had your pride, even if it was battered, and it wasn’t letting the twisting urgency of your stomach sway you.

“It’s shit food anyway,” He tells you. “But it’s the best shit food ‘round.” 

His motion is exaggerated as he opens bag and pulls free a burger wrapped in yellow wax paper. Your stomach flips and you swallow to mask the way your mouth is salivating.

You decided, then, that he’s a cruel son of a bitch.

There’s a knowing, mocking, look in his eye light a he bites into it. He makes a show of chewing, humming and remarking. “I heard that human food is different than monster food.”

You don’t rise to the bait and turn away. You try not to think how badly your stomach cramps. You haven’t eaten since the Ruins, surviving the last few days on water that helps keep the bile from jumping into your mouth in protest of your belly’s emptiness. You try, then, to focus on the aches in other parts of your body. There are many because you learned, the second night, that the monster didn’t always want you to talk.

He’d demanded you tell him where the human was headed, where they might go. 

You had rather eloquently told him to fuck himself.

You weren’t afraid of him yet.

You didn’t know you had to be.

You mocked him about the kick to the head, smiling triumphant as you wondered if the crack that dominated the empty socket was your fault. He had scowled, then, emoting with his brow bones as his smile barely even twitched. You should have stopped, but you thought you got under his ‘metaphorical’ skin.

 You knew better now.

It was your first taste of magic. Your entire body was filled with fire and you felt strangled by an invisible hand. It was a heavy pressure in your chest that made you want to vomit. You choked and wheezed, eyes narrowing on the monster beyond the bars. It felt as if your chest was being excavated by phantom claws scraping at your lungs like a carnivore ripping into a wildebeest. You know you would have been screaming had you the breath to.

The tension built in your breast until you thought he might kill you then and there. A bright light sheds free of your skin at the peak of it. It forms a cartoon reimagining of a heart sizzling with effervescent smoke that drips like condensation.

You feel empty before you feel weightless.

“ _Funny”_  He growled, _“Weren’t you the bitch begging us not to hurt you?”_

He threw you into the ceiling once, twice, then three times until you were unconscious. When you woke, he was gone and you cried yourself to sleep. You learned not to antagonize him.

So when you felt the same electricity spark up your spine in warning, you turn back to face him with a disgruntled huff. He chuckles and rips another piece of the burger to toss it between his teeth. He’s pulled out a cellphone while you were turned. It reminds you of the Nokia you had when you a teenager. You are glad, in a way, because you can focus on it and the annoyance it brings to his brow. He rolls his eye light as he prods the dial pad with his blunted thumb.

You never thought you’d be able to describe what it felt like to starved and taunted by a skeleton interrogator. But here you were and here he was.

“You’re not going to ask me today?” You say, barely above a whisper.

He doesn’t look up. “Hmm? Oh, right, depends.” The red light finds you for a brief second. “Gonna stop being a tight ass ‘bout it?”

You snort, but you are anxious. Truth of it was that you had _no idea_ where Frisk might have gone. You don’t even know where you are – but can you afford to say that? You’re worth something while he thinks you know something. He would just simply kill you. He had already proven he wasn’t afraid to hurt you. The aches in your chest and shoulders remind you cruelly of that terrifying fact.

“Why do you need them?” you question, tugging your blankets closer to you. The moth-eaten material scratches at raw, puffy skin making you inhale sharply through your teeth. “You… told me you want their soul… W-why not mine?” The suggestion makes your throat constrict, but you’re searching for some sort of answer. You look down at your legs, the bruises that littered them that were ugly and green, and wonder if it’s a good idea.

He tilts his chin toward you, the timbre of his voice dripping dangerously as he says. “Are you offering?” the one light disappears and he’s staring at you with empty sockets

You cower slightly, arms pressed to your chest as he simply shrugs, casting the unstable red circle back to his phone. “You’re the wrong colour, bud.” It was a simple answer, you guess. If not explaining a damn thing at all. "Need Red, not Orange."

“Oh.” You reply lamely.

His expressions are hard to read, but you’re afraid when he begins speaking in a tone that’s daring to sound conversational. “Throw me a bone and I’ll throw you some scraps.” He kicks the abandoned bag with the toe of his red and black sneaker, “let’s start simple,” he sighs closing his cell with a hard snap, “What’s your name?”

Ah. That’s a question.

It’s simple, he’s right.

“S-something else?” You try not to stutter as you ask. 

“Are you kidding me?” He spits, practically radiating irritation. His hand is raised lazily, as if to wave, and you feel sick. “I’m trying to be _nice_ here.”

“I-“ you begin, but you bite into your cheek when your chin smacks into the floor. He’s pressed you into the floor with an invisible force. It’s not electric, it’s a nauseating pressure behind your navel. “I don’t know!” you scream, voice cracking in blind desperation.

“You don’t know your own name?” He questions, enunciating each word like he’s speaking to someone slow. There’s nothing but skepticism in his inflection and stance.

“No,” You sob. Your body aches with old and fresh pain that thrums through you like shards of glass. “ _Please stop.”_

He doesn’t and you lose consciousness the fifth time your back meets the south wall.

 


End file.
